Revolutionary camera app removes unwanted bystanders and tourists from your Instagram photos
- The app costs $2.99 from the App Store but it is not yet available on Android
- Artist Damjanski created the software using a detection algorithm called YOLO
- It removes the person from the image and then fills it in that person’s absence
- The artist admits that the technology is ‘slow’ and leaves a smear of pixels
A new app can help give you the perfect Instagram shot by removing bystanders and tourists from photos in busy locations.
Named Bye Bye Camera, the developer describes it as an art project and an app ‘for the post-human era’.
Artist Damjanski created the software with Do Something Good, an ‘incubation collective’ where coders and artists pool their resources to create projects.
The app uses the same AI tools found in facial recognition software to identify people using an object detection algorithm called YOLO (You Only Look Once).
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It then uses a separate tool to fill in the space left behind with what Adobe has dubbed ‘context-aware fill’.
‘One joke we always make about it is: ‘finally, you can take a selfie without yourself,’ Damjanski said.
Damjanski admits that Bye Bye Camera is slow at the moment and removes people with a ‘great deal of mess’, and leaves behind a smear of pixels.
The app costs $2.99 (£2.35) from the app store and is already available for iOS users but it isn’t on Android devices yet.
‘It’s a gentle nod to a future where complex programs replace human labour and some would argue the human race,’ said Damjanski.
A new app can remove people from photos you take in busy locations when bystanders and tourists in the background ruin your shot. Named Bye Bye Camera, the developer describes it as an art project and an app ‘for the post-human era’
Damjanski admits that the app is slow and removes people with a ‘great deal of mess’, and leaves behind a smear of pixels. The app costs $2.99 (£2.35) from the app store and is already available for iOS users but it isn’t on Android devices yet
‘A lot of friends asked us if we can implement the feature to choose which person to take out.
‘But for us, this app is not an utility app in a classical sense that solves a problem. It’s an artistic tool and ultimately a piece of software art.’
Back in 2017, FaceApp began using machine learning to change people’s expressions and swap their ages and genders.
Two years later, Snapchat’s gender-swap feature has been used by police officers to catch predators talking to underage girls.
HOW DOES FACIAL RECOGNITION TECHNOLOGY WORK?
Facial recognition software works by matching real time images to a previous photograph of a person.
Each face has approximately 80 unique nodal points across the eyes, nose, cheeky and mouth which distinguish one person from another.
A digital video camera measures the distance between various points on the human face, such as the width of the nose, depth of the eye sockets, distance between the eyes and shape of the jawline.
A different smart surveillance system (pictured) can scan 2 billion faces within seconds has been revealed in China. The system connects to millions of CCTV cameras and uses artificial intelligence to pick out targets. The military is working on applying a similar version of this with AI to track people across the country
This produces a unique numerical code that can then be linked with a matching code gleaned from a previous photograph.
A facial recognition system used by officials in China connects to millions of CCTV cameras and uses artificial intelligence to pick out targets.
Experts believe that facial recognition technology will soon overtake fingerprint technology as the most effective way to identify people.
